Cool story.

I think Coyote Ugly has pics of an X-15 in front of his Dad's service station in Austin Nevada. It landed at Smith Creek dry lake, and was being trucked back to Edwards.

Gump

That would be cool pics

SR-71 unbelievable ......Takes me longer to get GPS dialed in

West Coast to East Coast of USA (National Record-Speed Over a Recognized Course): Coast to Coast Distance: 2,404.05 statute miles...Time: 1 hr 07 min 53.69 secs...Average Speed: 2,124.51 mph

DonC wrote:SR-71 unbelievable ......Takes me longer to get GPS dialed in

West Coast to East Coast of USA (National Record-Speed Over a Recognized Course): Coast to Coast Distance: 2,404.05 statute miles...Time: 1 hr 07 min 53.69 secs...Average Speed: 2,124.51 mph

In one of Brian Shul's books, he quoted an SR-71 Systems Operator "We did Kansas in seven minutes today...and that's not a bad way to do Kansas."



That bit on the X 15, though.....as you noted, balls of steel.....look at the size of those "fuel tanks" hanging on the outside of that thing. And, part of the tail melted off during the flight???? Holy shit! I think I just made a pact with myself to never, ever fly an airplane that's likely to have parts melt off in flight due to the heat..

MTV

I just made a pact with myself to never, ever fly an airplane that's likely to have parts melt off in flight due to the heat..

Ya know.... I say the same thing to myself every time I drag my POS C172TD out of the hangar and into the air, and watch the cars on the freeway pass me by.

Gump

"Where do we get such men?"--Frederic March as the Admiral, The Bridges at Toko-Ri.

Cary

"Such Men" are the ones who push the envelope today, and get blasted by all the internet do-gooders and our over-regualated and litigious leaning society in general, every time they do something not perfectly safe and easy.

Today's FAA wouldn't allow Charles Lindbergh to make his trans-Atlantic flight. Too dangerous.

Gump

GumpAir wrote:Today's FAA wouldn't allow Charles Lindbergh to make his trans-Atlantic flight. Too dangerous.

Gump

They barely did then either.
Signed,

Wrong-Way Corrigan.

Yup.....

The interviews of the 12 pilots who flew the X-15 are fascinating. These guys were some of the best in the world, and that airplane intimidated every one of them.

At ignition, it was accelerating at 2g. That increased to 4g by burnout. The longest X-15 flight was flown by Neil Armstrong. It was 12 minutes 30 seconds.

Milt Thompson (a hugely qualified test pilot himself) remarked that the X-15 was the only airplane he ever flew where he was glad when the engine quit.

The video below was one of the reasons I became a pilot. I watched it so many times as a kid that I wore out the VHS tape it was recorded on.

It's called 'An American Adventure: The Rocket Pilots' and is the best X-15 documentary I've ever seen. If you haven't seen it, set aside an hour and watch.

It's a VHS rip, so the quality is marginal at best, but you won't care..

Edit:
Version 1: This version has the entire show, but the quality isn't as good.





Version 2: Better quality, but missing some important parts.